Missouri Professor Challenges Constitutionality Of Campus Carry Ban

Missouri strengthened its right to bear arms in 2014 by adding a provision that requires strict scrutiny of all gun laws. Now a college professor that teaches a Second Amendment course is challenging the state’s ban on campus carry:

A University of Missouri professor is filing a lawsuit against the school for prohibiting guns on campus, in what is aimed to be one of the first tests of the state’s newly amended constitution that provides for “strict scrutiny” of gun restrictions.

Royce de R. Barondes, who is an associate professor of law at the University of Missouri, is challenging the campus’ policy that “the possession of firearms on university property is prohibited except in regularly approved programs or by university agents or employees in the line of duty.”

The lawsuit, being accepted in state court Monday, claims the university’s policy is unconstitutional under a 2014 strengthening of its state “second-amendment” provision. The amendment declares that the right of every citizen to keep and bear arms, ammunition and accessories in defense of his home, person, family, property or “when lawfully summoned in aid of civil power” cannot be questioned and is “unalienable.”

The law change made Missouri the second state in the nation, after Louisiana, to provide for so-called “strict scrutiny” of gun restrictions, which is the strongest level of protection.

“This case is an opportunity for good constitutional jurisprudence with us passing an amendment to our constitution last year,” said Jennifer Bukowsky, who is representing Mr. Barondes in the lawsuit. “The university’s rule is so obviously in violation of our state’s constitution, we see this case as being the best vehicle to protect one of our nation’s very first freedoms — our freedom to self-defense.”

Predictably, Bloomberg’s liberty-hating anti-self-defense groups are lining up against the law, improbably arguing that same students, faculty and staff who lawfully concealed carry off campus without incident somehow become homicidal maniacs when they step foot onto University property.